It is Men's Health Week 2019!

It's Men's Health Week!

Men's health week is a time to reflect on and promote all aspects of Men's Health. Whether it is looking at your personal health and wellbeing or starting a conversation with a family member, friend or with your community, this week is a time to start discussions about health and encourage all the men in our lives to take steps towards overall wellbeing!

This year's theme is Keeping Boys and Men Healthy promoting all men to take steps towards a healthy lifestyle.

What are the key things you need to know about the health of Australian men?

Did you know that many Australian men experience higher rates of health concerns including heart disease and diabetes? Mental health and wellbeing is also another key area impacting the wellbeing of boys and men. The good news is that we can make changes to lifestyle and environmental factors to significantly reduce the risk of health concerns and boost wellbeing!

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2. Start a conversation with the men in your life about health and wellbeing- post here to let us know how you go!

Chiming in quickly on this - depending on your approach, guys (and more generally, people) can get tetchy when you bring up their health. Most of us (in the general ungendered sense), know that there are things that we could be doing to be healthier - exercising more, eating healthier, drinking less...actually getting some sun outside of the commute to and from uni/work...

As a result, it's not uncommon to get a little defensive and shut down the conversation, because it can be easy to interpret any statements/questions about our health as a scolding due to the fact that we're already internally kinda judging ourselves for that pizza/burger/fried chicken wing/HSP we crammed into our face-hole last night.

Which isn't to say that you shouldn't have these conversations - while we might resist making healthy changes initially, there's no questioning that it's better for us in the long run. Sometimes people do need a little push. I'm just saying to be mindful of the way in which you start these conversations and the way that you respond to their answers. The forums and the way this community responds is great practice for that.

Ask open questions and start from less tetchy topics before moving onto more sensitive areas- instead of opening with diet or drinking habits, begin asking about sleep, or even just a general "how're you?". Once you've built a bit of rapport you can slowly get into the other stuff - e.g. "huh, I read the other day that high protein tends to keep people up at night - have you tried eating dinner earlier?". Sleep's a great one since most people are comfortable discussing theirs (or lack thereof) and it's linked to so much - from diet, to exercise, to mood and stress, so there's lots of ways to segue

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Thank you @Asche - some really great tips there about how to be mindful when starting a conversation about health and wellbeing! I really love the advice around open ended questions, and starting off soft start by asking how someone is going. It's really important to have that trust and safe environment

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Wow! I had no idea that there was that little actually mapped out in genetics. It's actually quite inspiring to realise that there is so much that men can do to take control of their health and to live longer.

I've recently been having a bit of a tough time with my partner. He sometimes struggles to speak about how he is feeling, and because that is one of my strengths it can be a bit of point of tension in our relationship at times. One really amazing step is that has started to see a counsellor and is starting to realise that it's completely fine and healthy for men to speak about their feelings and acknowledge when they're not doing so great.

We're working together to help him feel more comfortable to speak his mind, and that's super positive.

____________________________________________________“Your now is not your forever."― John Green, Turtles All the Way Down

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I used my social media (instagram) to promote men's health! Sharing a story can open the conversation and get people more involved!

2. Start a conversation with the men in your life about health and wellbeing- post here to let us know how you go!

I spoke with a friend about his yoga recently I am not an experienced yogi and it is something he is passionate about so it was a really great way for me to learn about yoga/his interests/how it benefits him!

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What a wonderful subject! It’s so important to talk about men’s mental health.

1. I think we can promote men’s mental health with checking in on men. Like the “R U OK” campaign - ask the men in our lives, fathers, sons, boyfriends, male friends, male co-workers etc. if they are ok. Ask them if they are concerned about something, ask if there’s anything we can do to help. Importantly just start talking to them about it. Making sure men’s mental health becomes more “normalised” and lose its stigma that it has to be kept silent.

2. I asked a few men in my life - my dad, brother in law, male friends. It went really well! I checked in and made sure they were ok and asked about their life. I was clear that I was wanting to check on them and that it’s important to ask everyone about their mental health including promoting mens. They expressed that they were grateful for me asking. So I think it was a very positive step towards promoting men’s mental health.